

Moderators: GlosOps, deltacharlie

By Archard
I went there on the 28th. May, to take advantage of the free landing fee voucher and I can vouch for all of the above. No booking in and out and just handed the voucher in at the cafe! Also, probably unlikely to receive an answer on the radio, so just transmit blind position reports, although I was able to obtain the QFE when crossing the hedge!

There were half hour air experience flights being conducted in a Pegasus hang glider, but when I enquired the pilot said he would do me a trial lesson for £65, which being more than the cost of flying in in a C150, the offer was declined!

Otherwise a great place to go for something slightly more unusual than the average type of destination.

Paul A.
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By Ridders
My advice is check the TODA and LDA - the runway has a significently displaced threshold. The 599 sounds tempting, but look where the threshold is :wink:

It is a great place - to visit by air or by road :D
By Archard
When requesting PPR I asked about the displaced threshold and was told to ignore it, as the whole of the runway was available, which turned out to be the case with no displaced threshold markings. Certainly long enough for a C150.

Paul A.
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By Ridders

Paul A.
Thats interesting as I didnt get such comments when I called them, but to be fair I didnt mention the threshold. Did they say ignore the trees and pylons too :wink: :D
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By Ridders
Its really nice.

You can see the 260ft pylons inthis photo. The runway is behind the yellow pup.
Theres also a house, hedge and trees further towards the runway on the 03 climb out if I remember correctly, which is left of the pup.
AIP says: "Pylon 203 ft aal, 0.8 km northeast of Runway 21 on extended centre-line."

We left via 21.

Heres a shot of the cafe - its really nice place to fly.

Some of the aircraft
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By Flying_john
I too wondered about the runway. Apparently its a question of a licenced bit and an unlicenced bit. There is the "as advertised" in the guide books, licenced runway then there is the extra 300metres or so at the end of the runway.

The pylons are quite away away and a simple gentle turn after take off, and in anycase a normal climb, will see you well clear of them. They really are not a factor.

By fuzzy6988
If there was an award for the most economical daytime VFR aerodrome that provides the quickest access to Central London, this has probably won the prize.

A 7 minute cab journey from this field takes you to Upminster followed by a 23 minute journey by rail into Fenchurch Street.

Wow. 30 minutes! :thumleft:
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By joe-fbs
Visited today to drop-off my son for university in the East End.

Trying to check in advance that they were operating, the landline number on SkyDemon is dead and no-one answered the mobile on their web site. They did respond promptly to an email to confirm that they were operating normally. Surprisingly easy to find from the air, it's just a field with some barely marked grass runways but there are lots of brightly coloured little aeroplanes that are easy to spot. SOHJ join went OK although it did require some air-air calls on the essentially unstaffed airfield frequency as we all seemed to have slightly different ideas about how to do it. No fuss, no landing fees, nice cafe with nice food, lots of interesting aeroplanes. What's not to like?

Local taxi company is 01 708 444 444. The telephone operator didn't know about the airfield so have the post-code to hand (RM14 2TN). Taxi took 45 minutes so plan for that.

Most of the aeroplanes there were microlights or aerobatic types with plenty of power. I was one of a very small number of standard conventional underpowered light aeroplanes (150 hp AA5). Not surprising, the runway is short, Pooleys shows 850 m but there is a line of pylons at the north end and a dip followed by trees at the south end so the airfield quotes 650m as the useable length. That was OK to arrive relatively heavy (son had plenty of luggage) but I certainly made the right decision to leave mum at home. Departing one-up on half fuel was fine but another person on board would have been unwise.

If you have the field performance, it's a a lovely destination and very convenient for east London, especially as it was marathon day so the trains and tubes would have been busy.
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By Derryn
Hi Joe

A few tips re taxis in case you need to do it ever again. Living in central London I don't have a car, so every trip to and from Upminster station is a taxi!

In terms of pickup from the airfield to get to Upminster station, Station cars is your best bet for minicabs on 01708 229400. They definitely know about the airfield. They can be a bit busy at peak times like Saturday afternoons, but I've never had to wait more than half an hour. That being said, for the past few months I've started using Uber to arrange a pick-up as their coverage in the area is a lot better these days and I've never had to wait longer than 10 minutes, which is perfect timing for getting the covers on the aircraft and wandering up to the carpark. I now only call station cars if there aren't any Ubers.

To get *to* the airfield from Upminster, you can't pre-book Station cars as its first-come first-served if you're leaving from the station. Quite often I've ended up with a long wait so if I'm in a hurry to get to the airfield I usually just jump in a black cab from the rank just outside the station rather than waste time wandering down the hill only to find out they don't have anything!

Station Cars is currently £6.50
Uber is about £6-8
Black cabs ~£10